The Two Man-Kzin Wars Trilogies

I am realizing that I have not read Jerry Pournelle's and SM Stirling's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" before. At least, it is not raising any memories. (In Man-Kzin Wars V, this story is "In the Hall..." on the contents and title pages but "The Hall..." on the tops of pages.)

The present plan is to finish reading this story. Over 100 pages to go: it is really a novel. It is interesting as a well-written installment of a future history and as overlapping with Poul Anderson's contributions to the same future history. I will probably reread Anderson's Man-Kzin trilogy in order to trace its connections with the Pournelle-Stirling trilogy. In any case, I have read Anderson's third Man-Kzin story only once so far, which is not enough.

These six works make a good series in their own right and as a turning point in Larry Niven's Known Space future history. Like Anderson's Psychotechnic History, Known Space divides into an STL and an FTL period. Niven shows STL interstellar warfare in Protector. Anderson shows such warfare, but only between two nearby planetary systems, in "Time Lag." The nature of man-kzin conflict changes dramatically when men acquire the hyperdrive at the end of the second Pournelle-Stirling story.

I may or may not read Man-Kzin Wars stories by other authors. The focus of this blog remains Poul Anderson and related writers, not Known Space, which is a whole other subject.

STL Or FTL

We, or at least I, think of interstellar future histories as either FTL, e.g., Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic and Technic Histories, or STL, e.g., Anderson's Maurai, Flying Mountains, Rustum, Kith, Harvest Of Stars and Genesis histories or Larry Niven's Leshy Circuit series.

(The mostly Earth-bound Maurai History goes interstellar in the time travel novel, There Will Be Time.)

However, some future histories have an STL period followed by an FTL period:

Robert Heinlein's Future History has generation ships, then Libby's FTL drive;

the Psychotechnic History has a generation ship, then the hyperdrive;

in Larry Niven's Known Space History, the Thrintun had FTL but the Pak did not;

also in Known Space, the early Man-Kzin Wars were fought at sub-light speeds but men won decisively when they had acquired the hyperdrive.

In an STL period or history, interstellar journeys last for objective decades or centuries but the travelers benefit from time dilation which alters perceptions of aging and of social change.

Two kinds of -

- imaginative fiction: fantasy and sf;
- sf: hard and soft;
- future history: British and American;
- interstellar travel: STL and FTL;
- time travel: circular causality and causality violation. 

Tomorrow Is Yesterday

Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History begins in the aftermath of that historical turning point, World War III. This war is not in our history - yet - but is certainly in our minds, in the collective imagination and in many works of fiction. However, it did not happen in our 1958. With the mere passage of time, the earliest installments of a future history series cease to be a possible future and become instead an alternative past. Future history becomes alternative history - unless the author takes the precaution of beginning his narrative much further in the future, as Anderson did with his second such series, the History of Technic Civilization.

If there is a hereafter and if people in that hereafter can meet those who die after them, then they will eventually hear what will sound like the plot of a fantastic future history novel. Larry Niven's and Jerry Pournelle's character, Allen Carpenter, is told that:

during the Cold War, the US supported Muslim insurgents against the USSR;
the US gave the insurgents weapons and money;
the insurgents built organizations;
the US invaded Iraq;
the USSR collapsed;
the Cold War ended;
Muslim terrorists hijacked planes and flew them into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon;
there were more wars...

We do not know what will happen in our future but we do know that, whatever it is, it will be at least as fantastic as that.

Future Politics

"'Nationalism everywhere,' the President sighed. 'Why?'
"No one had an answer to that."
-Jerry Pournelle, The Mercenary (London, 1977), p. 42.

This sounds like the "old and protean enemy" of the early period of Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History. See here and here.

In The Mercenary:

Democrats and Republicans have become two wings of the currently ruling Unity Party which supports the Codominium which keeps the peace by preventing nationalist wars;

Unity are opposed by the Patriot Party, the violently left wing Liberation Party and the growing Freedom Party;

a Patriot electoral victory will mean the US leaving the CD and war;

a Freedom victory will mean a relaxation of security, a Patriot coup and war;

Liberation causes riots but remains an electoral minority.

We know that something bad is bearing down if we know anything about the later course of this future history but it will be interesting to see whether Pournelle can present it convincingly enough. I echo the President's question: why all the nationalism?. 

Imaginative Aliens

Which of the future histories in the American sequence that we have been discussing presents the most imaginative aliens? It was clever of Niven and Pournelle to make their Moties asymmetrical. However, apart from that single important difference, a Motie's body is recognizably a humanoid form with two right arms and one right ear.

Niven's three-legged Puppeteers with their brains inside their bodies are definitely not humanoid. Nor are Poul Anderson's less well known Smokesmith the Reardonite or Rax.

One of Anderson's Didonians comprises three temporarily linked bodies. Although each of these bodies is comparable to a Terrestrial animal - rhino, goose and ape - their transient tripartite consciousnesses are entirely alien. See here.

Thus, here are five interesting alien intelligences appearing respectively in four future histories:

Pournelle's CoDominium series;
Niven's Known Space series;
Anderson's Psychotechnic History;
Anderson's Technic History.

Master Of Future Histories And A Few Questions

Poul Anderson wrote not only a robot story in his Psychotechnic History but also a US Robots story for Isaac Asimov's future history. Thus, of the seven future histories mentioned in the previous post, Anderson:

wrote two (Psychotechnic, Technic);
contributed to three (Asimov's, Niven's, Pournelle's);
addressed issues from two (Heinlein's, Asimov's) -

- and also wrote several other future histories. This gives Anderson a preeminent position as a future historian.

Regarding the issue that I raised concerning the locations of Alderson Points in Niven and Pournelle's The Mote In God's Eye (London, 1979), maybe the giant star had expanded to encompass the Point? However, the star is merely as big as the orbit of Saturn whereas the Points are described as located far from either stars or large planets.

Mote contains unexpected humor:

"'Let's go make first contact with an alien, Mr Renner.'
"'I think you just did that,' said Renner. He glanced nervously at the screens to be sure the Admiral was gone.'" (p. 110)

Is it appropriate that, as human beings approach first contact, some italicized passages present an alien pov? Is it appropriate that, in one such passage, the omniscient narrator informs us:

"The Engineer knew enough about the warship already to scare the wits out of Captain Blaine if he'd known." (p. 114)?

A passage on pp. 59-61 presents Blaine's pov:

"...Rod thought..." (p. 60);
"...Rod felt a wild internal glee..." (p. 61).

However, the same passage also informs us:

"...[the scanners] also showed several odd black silhouettes against that white background. Nobody noticed..." (p. 59)

Nobody, not even Rod, noticed? So this is the omniscient narrator again. Is his presence appropriate?

(Yet again: a large round number of posts near the end of a month. Do I take a break till Mar 1st or maintain the pace with the posts? We will find out.)

A Vast Space

I am mentally hovering over a vast conceptual space occupied by seven future histories written by six American sf authors. Beginning with Poul Anderson's monumental History of Technic Civilization and his earlier, shorter but surprisingly substantial Psychotechnic History, we look back to Anderson's predecessors, Heinlein, Asimov and Blish, and forward to his successors, Niven and Pournelle.

There are other future historians and other future histories by Anderson. However, these seven series can be considered as a group because four were edited by John W Campbell, two were written by Anderson and the last two incorporate collaborative writing, including contributions by Anderson. Anderson's Psychotechnic History addresses Heinleinian immortality and multi-generation interstellar spaceships and Asimovian robots and predictive social science. Pournelle's future history culminates in two novels co-written by Niven, with advice from Heinlein.

This makes the seven series sound like a single series. However, they remain seven distinct timelines. Common themes are:

(i) near future technological advances and social changes;
(ii) a period of interplanetary travel;
(iii) an FTL drive;
(iv) extrasolar colonization;
(v) interstellar imperialism;
(vi) the rise and fall of civilizations.

Heinlein, leading the way, concentrated more on (i) and (ii), reaching (iii) and (iv) only at the end of his original five volume Future History. (I do not accept any later volumes as valid continuations.)

Within this larger context, let me address two specific issues within Niven and Pournelle's The Mote In God's Eye (London, 1979). On p. 16, First Lieutenant Cargill, complaining about Engineer Sinclair's exaggerated Scottish accent, accuses him of speaking normally when he gets excited whereas, on p. 92, Cargill says that he sometimes cannot understand Sinclair when the latter is excited. So which way round is it?

P. 32 informs us that tramline end points are far from large masses whereas p. 97 informs us that the Alderson Point (presumably the same thing?) to a large star is within the star. (A spaceship's force field enables it to enter the star.)

The Art Of The Unexpected

The meaning of a text can be changed by a sequel. In PC Wren's Beau Trilogy, later volumes disclose that what we thought we knew when we read the first volume was wrong. There are scriptural precedents:

in the Hebrew canon, the Prophets apply the Law;
in the Catholic and Protestant canons, they prophesy Christ;
in the Koran, they include Jesus and culminate in Mohammad;
in the Granth, there are hymns written by Muslims.

Poul Anderson's first future history + interstitial passages by Sandra Miesel = an alternative history.

Although Anderson's Technic History is not presented as an alternative history, its major character, Nicholas van Rijn, visits the Old Phoenix, an inn accessed by important figures from alternative histories.

SM Stirling's Draka Volumes I and II present an alternative history of the twentieth century. Volume III introduces interplanetary travel and ends with a successful extrasolar colony in 2107 AD (109 Dispersal). However, Volume IV (see image) returns us to Earth in the 442nd Year of the Final Society (2442 AD). Further, the blurb makes clear that this will be a novel about travel between alternative histories! Thus, reading Vol IV immediately after Vol III requires such a massive change of perspective that I will need a short while to readjust.

Early Interstellar Travel II

(The first edition of Heinlein's Orphans Of The Sky.)

Here, I began to reflect on early interstellar travel in Poul Anderson's Psychotechnic History. Since then, I have profitably reread "The Troublemakers" as far as here.

Of the three lost FTL ships:

one became the first Nomad (see first link);

one founded a women only colony;

the crew of the third ship were stranded on an inhabited planet, as recounted in "Star Ship."

As I had suspected, the crew of the Star Ship in "Star Ship" are a small exploratory team, not the nucleus of a colony.

In the FTL period of the Psychotechnic History:

"Gypsy," "Star Ship" and "Virgin Planet" are a trilogy about lost starships;

"Teucan," "The Pirate" and The Peregrine are a trilogy about human-alien interactions;

"Star Ship" is also about human-alien interactions;

"The Acolytes" and "The Green Thumb" remain uncollected as yet;

"The Chapter Ends" is a far future culmination of mankind's conflicts with itself and its environment.

I must now return to SM Stirling's Draka History when I can establish how far I have read in The Stone Dogs.

Disagreements

Now I must state my disagreements with Poul Anderson's "The Troublemakers" (Cold Victory, New York, 1982).

The purpose is to colonize a planet of Alpha Centauri. However, the means to achieve this purpose is a six mile long spaceship taking a hundred and twenty three years, five or six generations, to deliver ten thousand people to Centauri. Is the sole purpose of those five or six generations to deliver human genes to Centauri?

Surely this particular means generates a subsidiary purpose: to study the cosmos from the unique vantage point of an interstellar spaceship for a hundred and twenty three years? Such cosmic exploration has two aspects:

how much can be learned about astrophysics, cosmology, cosmic radiation, the interstellar medium, the structure of space, unexpected discoveries en route etc?;

how will this new, small, purposive community express itself artistically and culturally during nearly a century and a quarter in space?

To begin with, the crew's attention needs to be focused outwards at the universe, not inwards at their own environmental or social arrangements. When discussing this with the secret psychologists, Friday concedes too easily that perhaps only ten percent of the population would be able to occupy themselves with science, art or music. What population? That may have been true of the seven thousand people on board in 2205, as described in the story. However, the Pioneer had been launched in 2126 with a crew of only two hundred. That crew could have been picked for their expertise in the arts and sciences. Heredity, education and culture would ensure that the majority of the following five or six generations remained focused on scientific and artistic endeavors.

Captain Gomez refers to:

"'...lives...spent in a cramped and sterile environment far from the green Earth...'" (p. 106)

The fact that their enclosed, artificial environment is entirely changeless and unchallenging is supposed to account for the crew's internecine strife. But the environment should not be like that. If conscious beings are going to cross interstellar distances, then they need to carry their environment with them and a human environment is more than cabins and corridors. In fact, the psychologists even seem to have made the Pioneer more cramped than necessary to suit their purposes. However:

even in the Pioneer, the parks simulate a Terrestrial sky;

Anderson's later Selenarchs show us that, given enough energy and creativity, an entirely enclosed environment can nevertheless be spacious, colorful, dynamic and stimulating;

the Pioneer crew could have access to audiovisuals from Earth and to projections of what their Centaurian environment might look like instead of to the giant telescreens showing mindless, tasteless programs aimed at a lower social class.

The psychologists seem to seek the lowest common denominator instead of the highest.

Detail And Depth

(There are many covers of Orphans Of The Sky. This is the edition that I read in the 1960s, never suspecting that I would discuss a successor story, "The Troublemakers" by Poul Anderson, on a world-wide computer network in 2016.)

Anyone who has read Poul Anderson's many novels and collections might think, as I did, that his Psychotechnic History is a minor work, especially when contrasted with the same author's later future histories. I hope that I have demonstrated that this is not the case. Careful rereading and reflection reveal apparently endless details and depths in this series. I have still not finished discussing "The Troublemakers," in Cold Victory (New York, 1982).

Inside the generation ship, a small group of psychologists:

secretly controls and directs the "inevitable" (?) social conflicts, thus preserving a dynamic society while also providing a hard school for the rigors of colonization;

do not object when some crew members practice personal aggrandizement because such activity keeps those crew members occupied (!);

have engineered social injustices so that men of goodwill will campaign against injustice.

Both self-aggrandizement and social campaigning sharpen the crew. Events take their natural course with the few (how few?) psychologists "'...as unnoticed guides.'" (p. 107) They know that the demoted Evan Friday is organizing a Guildsmen's protective association but they had arranged for his demotion precisely so that he would engage in such activity. When Councillor Wilson plans mutiny, the Captain's assistant, Lieutenant Farrell, secretly a psychologist, is at Wilson's side, apparently as an ally.

However, no one, not even the transparently self-seeking Wilson, can be controlled like a puppet. Outwitting even his own supporters, he has acquired weapons from a sympathetic police officer so that now his men have the bulk of the police force bottled up in a park after an arranged riot. The attempted mutiny has "'...got out of hand...'" (p. 95) from the psychologists' point of view. Farrell, unable to leave Wilson, can nevertheless get a message to Friday to save the ship, knowing, or at least hoping, that Friday has sufficient following and resources to do this.

Explanations

Poul Anderson, "The Troublemakers" IN Anderson, Cold Victory (New York, 1982), pp. 31-110.

Of course, our hero must save the ship. Fortunately, Anderson makes it plausible that he should be able to do so. The mutineers guard the armory against anyone approaching along the corridors. However, Evan Friday, formerly of Astrogation, knows the plan of the ship. During the mutinously caused blackout, he is able to lead his men along dark corridors, avoiding key points held by mutineers, to an airlock. Walking across the outside of the ship in spacesuits with magnetic boots, they enter the armory by another airlock... This time, unlike in "Brake," Anderson spares us what could have been an interminable account of the fighting until the mutiny is defeated.

After the fighting, three men, the Captain, his assistant and the chief of Astrogation, explain the secret to Friday. The voyage will last one hundred and twenty three years. Approximately the first twenty years were spent completing the construction of the ship's interior. What is the crew to do for the remaining hundred years? Friday suggests science, music and the arts but is forced to concede that perhaps only ten per cent of the population can be occupied in this way. A static culture for the rest would not prepare them for the rigors of colonization.

However, the descendants of personnel chosen for energy, initiative and ability, looking for something worthwhile to do, will pursue personal aggrandizement! The psychological planners of the expedition knew that the original small private enterprises would become monopolies provoking reactions that could be predicted in general terms - although some events, like the great strike and the more recent riots and mutiny, did get out of control. Nevertheless, there is a plan. Asimov's Seldon would not have been able to make psychohistorical predictions about a few thousand people. His science and its Foundation Plan needed a Galactic population. But the few psychologists in the Pioneer are unable to predict its future history exactly.

Men like Wilson were allowed to pursue selfish ends but (i) they were to be defeated eventually and (ii) others responded more positively like Friday, who is to be the next Captain! Wilson was unexpectedly smart and nearly succeeded but, fortunately, Friday was on hand to stop him. The idealist Friday had been demoted precisely so that he would learn practical politics. Next, because of their role in quelling the mutiny, the Guilds will, after some further necessary difficulties, gain a seat on the Council, where they will be represented by Friday. Then, the Guilds will join with Astro, oust the other factions, hopefully without violence, restore a mercantile economy and make Friday Captain.

"The Troublemakers" is set in 2205. Friday should become Captain in about 2210. The psychologists, who will by then include Friday, will have reunited humanity in the Pioneer four or five years before 2249, when the ship is due to reach Alpha Centauri. Thus, Friday will spend about thirty five years leading the crew through social struggles that will eventually reunite them with the common purpose of colonization.

I have done my best to summarize the argument but I also disagree with it and will explain why in another post.

Directions

"This is revolution, he thought. You don't know what's happened, you don't know who's fighting or where the fighting is, you sit and wait and listen to the people going they don't know where."
-Poul Anderson, Cold Victory (New York, 1958), pp. 88-89.

That is one side of revolution. The other side is people who do know that they are fighting and where they are going, whether a clique seizing power or a population overthrowing a dictatorship.

"They wound up the levels, feeling their bodies grow heavier..." (p. 94)

Surely, if they are approaching heavier levels, then they should experience this approach as a descent? But I am confused about how centrifugal force works. Earlier:

"An elevator took them up to officer level. Actually, thought a dim corner of Friday's mind, the term should have been 'down,' since they were increasing centrifugal 'gravity'; but the notion of the upper classes living 'upward' was too ingrained for usage to change, even though on any one level 'down' meant the direction of acceleration." (p. 76)

We understand the difference between physical up and down and social up and down. Someone might travel "down" to London because it is in the south of the country or"up" because it is the capital. However, if the elevator is experienced as descending, then it is hard to imagine that it would be thought of as going "up." And the direction of acceleration is "down" within a single level? I do not get that last bit.

The Size Of The Ship

Turning down an offer from Wilson, Evan Friday quits his machine job to become the paid organizer of a Guildsmen's protective association about three weeks before Wilson's Brotherhood of Workers mutinies. Friday comments:

"'The ship is six miles long and two miles in diameter. How does Wilson expect to take it over with a thousand men at best?'"
-Poul Anderson, Cold Victory (New York, 1982), p. 88.

He can seize key points and officers but how can he resist the better armed police?

I never before knew the size of a generation ship. Is anyone able to calculate its volume or diameter?

I nearly bypassed "The Troublemakers" but it is proving to be the most substantial installment of the Psychotechnic History. Heinlein's generation ship crew had mutinied. They must have gone through experiences similar to those that Anderson describes here.

History In The Pioneer

The Pioneer left the Solar System in 2126. Evan Friday, twenty four in 2205, studies the history of the ship but does not tell us every date:

the small private farms of the early years were replaced by a food trust;

in 2160, leading Engineers provoked a violent general strike by underpaid workers in that trust;

the strike overthrew the trust;

the Engineers had wanted to divide and weaken food producers by returning them to the earlier system;

however, upper Administration preferred to socialize food production, packaging and distribution under its own bureaucracy;

Admy won and confronted Engy as a powerful new rival;

when Captain Petri died in 2162, Engy and Admy, ignoring the rule that the first mate should have succeeded, nominated instead the young Juan Gomez from Astrogation;

Astro, a small officers only group, played the two more powerful Departments off against each other;

for a few years, the overlords' bully gangs clashed, green and gray workers became restless, young officers became arrogant and exclusive and Admy used ship's law to aggrandize its leaders;

in 2171, the private forces of Engy and Admy waged war over the extent of Admy jurisdiction;

although the two small sides lacked effective weapons, there was death, damage and suspension of services;

Astro rallied police and other groups to end the war;

ship's articles were amended with police power transferred from Admy to the Captaincy, thus effectively to Astro;

Admy opposed the move but Engy supported it because it weakened Admy;

Astro acquired followers, investments and political contacts;

in 2176, lower Engy ranks violently revolted and were suppressed although the Captain's Court then made concessions disliked by most officers;

in 2182, Duncan, chief of Admy, tried to seize the Captaincy but was defeated with the help of Engy;

however, his power passed to his successor with help from Astro;

in 2187, Admy and Astro ended officer ownership of factories and socialized them, having acquired sufficient fighting strength to enforce this;

from 2187 to 2201, the ship owned all important facilities, with ultimate control exercised by the Captain and his Council;

a combine mainly of Astro officers held, and struggled to keep, the balance of power;

characteristic ship art, literature and music began plus scientific advances in astrophysics and the biological effects of cosmic radiation;

the laboring classes organized unions which merged as the Brotherhood of Workers, led by Wilson;

independents organized in Guilds but had no effective voice;

in 2201, the Council violently suppressed a general strike but let Wilson onto the Council from which position he began to make alliances with younger, more liberal, officers;

in 2205, Wilson wants all but purely personal property to belong to the ship with plants governed by workers' councils;

other factions want either a return to some earlier stage of the ship's history or an advance, e.g., to complete economic and political control by a hereditary officer caste;

Captain Gomez, chairing the Council and controlling the police, is supported by conservative officers and possibly by most commons although McMurtrie, chief of Astro, might hold ultimate power;

the ship is ready for another upheaval.

Society In The Pioneer

In Poul Anderson's "The Troublemakers," Evan Friday, formerly a junior officer, now a machine worker in Engineering, befriends a family of shopkeepers who sell ornaments and household objects of wood, plastic and metal. Thus, Friday gains perhaps a unique perspective on the social diversity within the Pioneer.

The demagogic Councillor Wilson declaims that farming and Engineering workers, greens and grays, comprise more than six of the seven thousand people on board and that:

"'Everybody else on board is riding on your backs...'" (Cold Victory, p. 66)

- but goes on to list professions like doctor and teacher which are surely necessary.

Friday challenges Wilson's figures. The latest census shows:

1000 Engineering;
500 food;
300 public service;
700 Guildsmen and other independents;
500 officers and their families;
4000 housewives, children and aged -

- so there are 1500 greens and grays. Dictatorship by them would not be democratic. (However, I would count their entire families as members of the same socioeconomic class.)

Friday tells his shopkeeper friends that Wilson's rule would be "'...nominal communism...'" (p. 73) but really old style dictatorship. Here then is a recognition that "communism" does not mean "dictatorship."

Politics in The Pioneer

A crewman says:

"'Any ship is a natural communist state.'" (Cold Victory, p. 53)

I would say that a large interstellar spaceship with a population of seven thousand is a natural communist society. Here, "communism" means common ownership and control, not a bureaucratic dictatorship falsely claiming to administer common ownership and control. A "communist society" is one that is not, or not yet, divided into economic classes - the earliest such classes being slave-owners and slaves. Thus, hunting and gathering societies are primitive communisms.

A "state" is a body of armed men that becomes necessary to maintain social order when society has divided into classes - the earliest such state being soldiers guarding granaries controlled by priests. It follows that "a communist state" is a contradiction in terms. But the man who uses this phrase means by it what I mean by "a communist society."

Evan Friday considers three ways of organizing the ship:

(i) "...a politicking communism..." (p. 54);
(ii) "...a realm of little, short-sighted tradesmen..." (pp. 54-55);
(iii) "...the rule of the best, the aristos..." (p. 55).

(i) The communist movement within the ship is led by Wilson. Friday thinks that Wilson is a demagogue who would not let workers have much say if he got what he wanted. This is "politicking communism," clearly different from communism as discussed in the opening paragraphs of this post.

(ii) is clear enough.

(iii) "...rule..." implies government through a state apparatus. Thus, rule is unnecessary if there is no need for a state. Leadership by the best, i.e., by those who are best able to lead, is necessary in any society.

Friday elaborates his idea of aristos:

"...a hierarchy restrained by law and tradition and open on a competitive basis to anyone with ability." (p. 55)

A hierarchy competitively open to those with ability ceases to be hereditary whereas I think that a hereditary hierarchy is our idea of an aristocracy? But, in any case, the meaning of "aristos" can evolve. However, if, as is possible, the entire population of the ship were to be involved in discussion and decision-making through meetings and communications systems, then the "most able" would be able to lead that democratic process without needing to be organized into a separate hierarchy.

Friday concludes:

"...it had to be an unquestioned rule, or you got the sort of anarchy which had prevailed aboard the Pioneer." (p. 55)

"Anarchy" means "no rulers" whereas Friday instead means conflict and chaos. Democratic discussion and decision-making do not automatically generate blackjacks, knuckledusters, private armies or riots. But any attempt to impose unquestioned, thus undemocratic, rule would provoke physical resistance.

This is my condensed response to an extremely condensed and substantial passage in Poul Anderson's "The Troublemakers."

Life Inside A Generation Ship

The Pioneer

2126 departure, crew 200.
2205 en route, crew 7,000.
2249 arrival, crew 10,000.

The early crew spent the first ten or twenty years completing construction of the ship's interior. Later generations:

repair or replace machines;
build new ones;
work as technicians.

Human labor makes robots unnecessary;
a thirty hour week provides a living wage;
some crew work part time, then earn more as, e.g., prostitutes or goons;
self-employed tradesmen, artists, artisans and writers work their own hours, some on officer decks;
parks have simulated skies.

One crewman's explanation of the social degeneration within the ship:

a ship is a natural communist state;
but private groups were allowed to run farms, factories and recreation;
companies were founded, fought each other and oppressed workers;
workers had to form unions;
food processors won against producers and formed a trust;
the Engineering Department took over industries;
food and factories competed for control of the ship;
farm collectivization came too late to stop the power struggles;
solution - socialize everything under the Council, giving workers the main voice.

Wilson, demagogic crew representative on the Council, leads a communist movement.
The Guilds agitate against monopolies and for a petite-bourgeois economy.
Officers are aristocrats but interpret this as personal aggrandizement, not as traditional responsibility.

Who dealt this mess?  

Seven Thousand People

A mere seven thousand people in the starship, the Pioneer, live less like a spaceship crew and more like a small planetary population.

Officers
Astros
Engys
Admys

They are divided not only departmentally but also on issues of power and policy.

Crew
machine workers
farmers
deckhands
graded technicians
"chants" (I cannot find this word)
small manufacturers

The different groups riot. Chants and manufacturers want a return to free enterprise and independent representation on the Council. Factions and powerful individuals maintain gangs of goons and bullies outnumbering the police. The Captain is (seen as) a puppet of continually shifting groups wielding real power.

I admit that, when I first read that many years ago, I just accepted it but it is the strangest description of a spaceship crew that has ever been written. An explanation will be given but will it be adequate?

A Slum In Space

In crew quarters on the starship Pioneer:

halls are drabber and dingier;

the smaller apartments are poorly furnished;

metal-working is audible;

many crew spit and swear on seeing a policeman;

unmarried workers sleep in tiered bunks in cave-like barracks where a giant telescreen shows mindless, tasteless entertainment suitable for this class;

when Friday, the officer who wanted rights for the crew, is demoted to the crew, he must fight one of them;

fortunately, as a member of his aristocratic caste, he has learned fighting techniques to keep fit.

On Earth, such slums have grown from unplanned social interactions but this one is in a spaceship launched by a civilization ruled by psychotechnicians. Something does not add up but all will be explained in due course.